To be successful, you have to start somewhere… To be successful, you have to start somewhere.. LAG Dobrichka make dreams come true for people from the largest municipality in Bulgaria Nadezhda Vasileva - CEO of LAG Dobrichka - Mrs. Vasileva, Dobrichka municipality is one of 16 municipalities in the country and the only one in the area, whose local development strategy won funding. Tell us more about a Local Action Group? - LAG Dobrichka is an association of representatives of the public sector, businesses and civil society, living and / or working in Dobrichka municipality. Nowadays, the association counts 49 members, one of them is the municipality itself. Developed under the project of a preliminary measure, the Local Development Strategy of Dobrichka municipality was approved by Ministry of Agriculture and Food, and on October 13, 2011 LAG Dobrichka Association was officially invited to sign a contract for financing - tripartite agreement - between an association LAG Dobrichka, Ministry of Agriculture and Food and the State Fund "Agriculture" - Paying Agency. The amount of the financing of our strategy is 3.22 million BGN, which will be available to support projects of people or entities of Dobricka municipality, whether members of a local action group, and will support activities that take place in the same territory. - When did you start establishing the group and who belong to it? - In January 2007 was established LAG Dobrichka - as a non-profit organization - association of enthusiasts from the public, business and civil sector. Previously were held couple of informational meetings with groups of farmers, civil sector, community centers, NGOs, directors of schools and kindergartens, mayors and deputy mayors, members of municipal administration. Dobrichka municipality is also a member of the association. Authorities of the association are the General Assembly and Board of Directors. Chairman of the Board of LAG Dobrichka is the mayor of the municipality Mr. Petko Petkov, as the experience of other 2 LAGs in the country. The term of office of this Board - after the last General Assembly and the statutes of the association, is four years - as much as it is the mandate of deputy managing team. Is not irrelevant combination of management, operation is a joint. One without the other organ would work very hard. Everything is about the cooperation. In order of Ministry of Agriculture and Foods № 23 requirement public sector should be not more than 49% of the composition of the General Assembly and in the composition of the Board. Our Board consists 9 members. Representation in the Board is currently distributed in proportion - three members are from the public sector, three - from business and three are from the civil sector. This will play a very important role when we get to the evaluation, and classification of projects, because the members of the Board must participate in committee. There were also external experts invited for the recruitment. These experts are licensed in the relevant ministries, not just random people and were chosen after a contest held. - On what territory was established LAG Dobrichka? - Local Action Group Dobrichka was established in an area covering the administrative boundaries of Dobrichka Municipality. Specific in this municipality is its unconventional administrative-territorial structure. It has no natural center and is formed on the principle of a set of 68 villages situated around the district center - the city of Dobrich. LAG territory is located near the Black Sea and its resorts, is a peripheral territory of the Black Sea area and is near the border with Romania. The area within the LAG Dobrichka is 1298 km2 - the largest area in Bulgaria. According to NSI data, to December 31, 2009 has 24,292 inhabitants, of which 12 110 men (49.88%) and 12,182 women (50.12%). The territory has 68 villages. The population density is 18.71 people / km2, which is twice lower than the average of Dobrich (42.31 inhabitants / km2) and almost four times lower than the national average (69.6 inhabitants / km2) . - What are the objectives of the LAG Dobrichka? 3 - Strategic objective of LAG Dobrichka is the territory to become a living countryside through targeted action in partnership with the local community. There are two priorities - improving the competitiveness of local products and improving the quality of life within the LAG Dobrichka. - How was Local Development Strategy of LAG Dobrichka established? - In 2010 a team of 5 people, including 3 experts trained by Ministry of Agriculture and Food, some of which are also members of the Board now, was working on the project "Acquisition of skills and achievement of social activity for potential LAG territory Dobrichka municipality ". This project was conducted 10 informational meetings, which are broadcast on local leaders - ambitious people who have different expectations and visions for the development of their villages. Some of them were invited to participate in training local leaders, and others - in training on implementation of the Strategy. At these meetings trainers shared their views, dreams, desires and needs with experts. Exactly these needs gave us directions for development in the strategy to. It is not without significance - Judging just by the needs of people living in the municipality. Summary of the meetings information was incorporated in the draft strategy, whit this same team as an interested new 10 meetings in core villages. Following these meetings and discussions was created Local Development Strategy of the Dobrichka municipality - that was applied to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food funding. Strategy of LAG Dobrichka was ranked second in the country and one of the 16 who received funding. - Is this the reason strategy of LAG Dobrichka to get such a high score? - Yes. Because the strategy was not written as a purely scientific work and relies on the actual needs people have. The team and the experts who prepared the 4 strategy did great job. - The contract for the financing was signed at the end of 2011. What does it do? - On October 13, 2011 was signed a trilateral agreement between the association LAG Dobrichka, Ministry of Agriculture and Food and the State Fund "Agriculture" - Paying Agency. It is around 4 million BGN. The contract includes two measures. One is for 3.22 million BGN for the implementation of the Local Development Strategy. This actually will reach people and potential beneficiaries. These funds are allocated in the budget for 2012 and 2013. The rest is for project management team who works to accomplish the activities. It is important to know that help given by LAG team to the potential beneficiaries is free. Most of the activities planned are to organize workshops and round tables, informational seminars, calls for proposals, trainings for the preparation of project proposals, training courses for project management. Also we are planning to set up expert committees and hold a training course for project evaluators. - Which measures can be applied? - Measures which can be applied to the LAG Dobrichka project are 7 - defined in the Strategy. Projects of our potential beneficiaries, must meet the requirements of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food regulations on appropriate measures and also requirements of the Strategy. So they go through another screen by responding to this strategy, and in the creation of which are involved themselves. On 1 February this year announced simultaneously taking all measures of the Strategy. Proposals under this call will be accepted until September 30 this year. Next year we will publish another call. Contracts will be concluded by September 2013, and projects will be implemented by September 2015. One of the measures is a measure 121 - "Modernization of agricultural holdings". Here I should mention that the grant for young people is 50%, for older people - 40% - so our aim is to encourage young people to apply. Measure 123 - "Support for food processing plants" has a budget of 670 000 BGN. Measure 311 - "Development of non-agricultural industries or services from farmers", measure 312 - "Micro projects for non-agricultural products and services." Measure 321 is "Establishment or 5 improvement of infrastructure services, cultural, social and sports." In this measure can apply municipal projects or NGOs and community centers. Measure 322 is also for municipal projects - rehabilitation of streets, parks, public buildings - historical, cultural and religious. Here we rely heavily on the initiative of the population, local authorities, mayors, deputy mayors. And there is a measure with a small budget that is specific only to our strategy - Measure 323 "Protection and improvement of rural heritage." It has a 100% grant and has a budget of 50,000 BGN. - Who can apply for funding? - Mandatory condition of Ordinance 23 of Ministry of Agriculture and Food applicant must be a resident - if an individual, or to operate business in Dobrichka municipality - if a legal person.There will be no subsidiaries and branches of companies that are in another municipality with a formal registration within the LAG Dobrichka. In the very measures are included the purpose of the measure, eligible applicants - for each measure eligible applicants are different. Spelled are also eligible activities and eligible costs. Priority will be given to proposals gathered the required number of points according to the criteria for strategy. The following costs are not eligible for our strategy - for the purchase of machinery or equipment second hand, insurance of fixed assets for contributions and insurance staff for the purchase of land and buildings, VAT, interest, fines, penalties, leases. The idea of creating LAGs and our team ambition is to be financed as many smaller projects with more local initiative, more activity ideas and activities for the development of our villages and improvement of rural life. - What is the maximum funding on projects? - In different measures, the amount of funding is different.